"NCAA tournament Day 2 diary"

Big 10 haters may want to back down a bit. At least for now.

On Friday the Big 10 won two of three games to finish the first round a scintillating 5-1. If not for Illinois blowing a double-digit lead against Virginia Tech, the league would have gone a perfect 6-0. The Illini didn't score in the final 4:20 of the game, allowing the seemingly dead Hokies to finally overtake them in the final minute. It was a pretty good choke job, no doubt about it.

But it certainly doesn't taint the Big 10's performance thus far. The league's teams may be boring to watch. Seriously boring. Even Ohio State and Wisconsin fans must have been switching channels to the Big 12 title game a week ago. Texas-Kansas was that much more exciting.

HOWEVA, as Stephen A. Smith would say, when it comes to playing hard-nosed, physical, smash-the-glass, no-easy-buckets basketball, no one is better than the Big 10. We saw this the past couple days. It took Marquette nearly 10 minutes to score a single point against Michigan State on Thursday. And Friday, Purdue dominated Arizona on the glass, 37-29, sending a message to the Pac 10 that you can't finesse your way to victories. Especially in March. Illinois did the same to Virginia Tech, until that collapse (which, honestly, I still can't believe happened).

The only Big 10 team that didn't look impressive in the first round was Wisconsin, which received a serious scare from Texas A&M-Corpus Christi. The Badgers trailed by as many as 18 points in the first half, but were saved in the second half by seniors Alando Tucker and Kammron Taylor, who scored 47 of Wisconsin's 76 points.

Wisconsin will definitely be challenged by UNLV in the second round, but I think it will move on. The close call will be beneficial, as there's no way Bo Ryan will allow his team to come out asleep on Sunday as it did on Friday.

The Big 10 should get at least two teams to the Sweet 16. I don't foresee Ohio State having much of a problem today against Xavier, and watch out tonight for Indiana against UCLA. If the Hoosiers can hit their 3's, they're a dangerous bunch.

Unfortunately for Michigan State and Purdue, they face No. 1 seeds in North Carolina and Florida, respectively. It would take supreme defensive efforts for them to corral their more talented opponents. Still, I foresee that by Sunday night critics will no longer be ripping the Big 10 and the committee's decision to select six teams from the league.

Speaking of the committee, it was pretty obvious from watching the first two days which two at-large teams didn't belong in the field of 65. Stanford and Arkansas. The Cardinal got absolutely rocked by Louisville on Thursday, and the Razorbacks didn't have much fight against USC on Friday. I'm sure - check that, positive - Drexel and Syracuse could have given better efforts. They belonged in the field.

Well, my upset picks backfired again on Friday. For some reason - maybe the fact that I just don't like the state of Virginia (bad family reunion; it's a long story) - I thought Virginia would fall to Albany. Boy, was I far off. It became clear, watching the Cavaliers, that at least in the first round, all a team needs are a couple of great guards. Sean Singletary and J.R. Reynolds were sensational for Virginia on Friday. They combined for 51 points on just 28 field goal attempts and also grabbed a combined 13 rebounds.

While inside-outside balance is necessary in order to win a championship, it isn't imperative in order to survive the first weekend. Virginia and Tennessee will be a great matchup of guards on Sunday. The Volunteers absolutely torched Long Beach State on Friday 121-86 – the 121 points the most scored in a tournament game in over 15 years - with three guards scoring 20-plus points led by Chris Lofton's 25. We should see a barrage of 3-pointers from these guard-dominated teams on Sunday.

Finally, the game to watch today (if you can only peep one - something I don't recommend). It's gotta be Texas A&M against Louisville in Lexington. There should be a raucous crowd for the Cardinals, but can anyone shake Acie Law? I don't think so. He's the most clutch player in the country. Still, this should be a heckuva game. Louisville will try to play at a frenetic pace while A&M will attempt to slow it down. Whoever wins the tempo battle should have the early edge, but I expect the game to go down to the end. And that's when Law will win it for the Aggies, 75-71.

My other picks for today:
- Ohio State over Xavier, 77-61
- North Carolina over Michigan State, 72-65
- Vanderbilt over Washington State, 75-69 (yeah, I know, I'm jumping on Vandy's bandwagon; just trying to be honest here)
- Georgetown over Boston College, 62-50
- UCLA over Indiana, 68-60
- Pitt over VCU, 66-58
- Maryland over Butler, 73-68

There should be several close games, if not upsets. Which will be in contrast to the first two days, which produced 23 games (out of 32) decided by 10 or more points.

It’s time for some drama.